On paper, the 2014 Senate cycle could hardly be going better for Republicans.

The Democrats are on defense, holding 21 of the 35 seats up for grabs next year. Several stalwart Democrats have announced their retirement, including Montana Senator Max Baucus, who announced Tuesday he would follow Iowa’s Tom Harkin and Michigan’s Carl Levin in not seeking re-election. Those veterans have won a combined 17 terms, and their departures leave tested political and fundraising machines on the table and give the GOP an opening in otherwise untouchable races. The implementation of Obamacare could complicate many others. History is on the Republican side; no sitting president’s party has gained Senate seats in the midterm of a second term. In recent cycles, the loss has averaged more than six seats — enough to give Republicans control.

But for all the early bright spots, Republicans had a similar opportunity to retake the Senate two years ago. Needing just four seats to regain control, and defending only 10 seats compared to the Democrats’ 23, Republicans managed to drop two seats, thanks to the impact of Barack Obama on the national ticket and poor candidates like Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock. The legacy of that disaster is proving to be hard for the National Republican Senatorial Committee to shake, even as the party’s electoral prospects improve.

In the first quarter of 2013, the NRSC’s fundraising was doubled by its Democratic counterpart in the first quarter of the year, $6.8 million to $13.7 million. “Donors want to see their money is being spent effectively now,” says one DC-based GOP operative. In a host of races that could be prime pickup opportunities for the party, potential GOP candidates are also sitting on the sidelines, waiting to test the political winds. “I’d wait if I were them too,” said one veteran Republican operative in a state with an open Senate seat. “We blew an easy cycle last time, so why stick your neck out for the Senate if you could run for governor or something else.”

The NRSC has largely cleaned shop since 2012, and communications director Brad Dayspring predicts the Democratic retirements will boost fundraising. “Opportunity is always attractive to donors,” he says. “Like it or not, retirements are a sign of weakness for Democrats and strength for us.”

But the six retirements may not prove catastrophic for the Democrats, even if they are making already antsy operatives downright nervous. Democrats have so far done a better job of candidate recruitment, which could help avoid damaging primaries. In some states, like Michigan and Iowa, no Republicans have jumped into the race yet. And in Montana, the popular former two-time Gov. Brian Schweitzer is considering running — arguably a stronger candidate that Baucus.

Dayspring blamed the focus on recruitment on the “second-by-second nature” of Washington reporting. “I can assure you that we will have candidates in all of these states,” he says, adding that historically many winning candidates have declared in the year of the election, rather than almost 18 months out.

Much is on the line for Republicans in 2014, which is likely the best and final opportunity to regain control of the Senate until at least 2018. In 2016, Democrats will have just 10 seats up for reelection while Republicans will have 24.

There is nothing mentioned in the entire article that addresses the reason the GOP lost ground everywhere. In the House and Senate, they lost seats, despite having gerrymandered themselves into a nearly permanent majority in virtually every red state. They couldn't even get 10 million white, middle class center-right Americans out to vote for them.

They aren't changing their policies. Without a change in policy, they're not going to get elected. All they have left is intolerance, hate and repression all in the name of God. That flies well in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran and other middle-eastern countries. But not so much in the United States of America.

All the intelligence has evaporated from the GOP base and all that is left behind is the crusty mineral deposits of a die hard group of aging racist Caucasian Christian zealots. Despite a terrible performance in 2012, the Republicans expect to perform better in 2014, because they believe that they are simply superior to the Democrats. There is no hope that they will ever learn from their mistakes and change. The GOP will not ever evolve because they do not believe in evolution; so they will gradually go extinct.

There are only two ways for the GOP to take back the senate; 1) Devil intervention or 2) With the NRA and corporate support that will buy the cheap politicians who sell their souls 30 silver pieces of coins . The latter most likely to be tried, as the former is already in their works. I never seen a party so extremely driven by selfishness, but it does prove that part of this country will have a very long stay on this earthly plane, eternal even.

“Donors want to see their money is being spent effectively now,” in other words the right wing extremists want to buy some good horse flesh this time instead of some nag like romney. white, but not too white, rich but not too rich, a slick double talking con man and handsome rascal, but not someone who makes rookie mistakes like governor oops.

a white latino like rubio would be ideal, but then again he is so left as to be almost as communist as castro. decisions, decisions, decisions. they do have plenty to pay for some favorable polls.

To be honest, I'd voted Republican before, never straight ticket, weighing the candidates. But with the road they've gone down these past few elections, I've avoided them like the plague. It'd be outright horrible to vote that way if there were no such thing as an Independent candidate, so at least as it stands it's only mildly depressing. My parents both admired Eisenhower and I think if I'd lived back then I would have t---

Holy Horus's Horses! Do I have to send you all to bed without supper?!?

If the current political climate doesn't shift I honestly don't see the GOP gaining seats in the Senate. They have been hurt too badly by the loss of Mr. Romney, the social policy mess brought about by their more conservative champions, their disadvantage in fundraising, the perception of their party as obstructionist, etc., etc., etc. I would be surprised if they broke even.

Maybe their loss will spur them into adopting new policy stances / finding candidates that are both rational and competent? That's probably a lot to ask for from this party.

@glennra3 YOU should care, run the republican dinosaurs OUT so the Democrats can legislate! Get our infrastructure funded well into the future, get people back to work in the USA, fund some innovations and get green energy off the ground while keeping coal and oil IN the ground!

@WolfBard eisenhower would never get into the republican party of get any support to run for anything. eisenhower is the one who warned us to beware the military/industrial complex that has now grown into our monstrosity of empire.

@curt3rd Election Fraud? Is that the excuse you are using for the fact that America has rejected your policies. Good for you. Why improve your message or create a stronger platform, when you can just close your eyes and scream Election Fraud.

I agree. The far right fringe in their party that independent voters find offensive cost them not only the 2012 election, but also 2008. The sensible members of their party walked away from both instances pleading for the group to find their center, but they've unfortunately been drowned out by the shrill nutjobs that think the most important things facing this country are things like finding Barack Obama's birth certificate or outlawing abortion. As a result, their brand is slowly dying.

Ah, now I understand why you're so fired up. Your real outrage with
me at this point isn't about KG violating TIME policy, it's the fact
that his actions (or the actions of anyone calling the employer) could
have resulting in the poster being fired.

Most employment
contracts are "at will" for both parties. The employer needs far less
than a phone call to justify the firing of an employee, 53_3.
Unfortunately, most jobs aren't cushy government positions that you
can't get fired from.

@53_3 I actually think we need to cut Zack some slack. Based on his posts on other threads I think he means well, and just wasn't fully aware of the scale of Kevin's transgressions both now and in the past.

@53_3@TyPollard all in red and lots of !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

@curt3rd Yeah, but assuming you have a FUNCTIONAL brain, you KNOW that Faux Nooze LIES frequently, (almost always.... I think they have like 18% truth which means that the other 82% is lying... remember Benghazi? EVEN a stacked House Republican heavy investigation committee found the Administration did nothing wrong _9_ separate times... why isn't Faux Nooze reporting THAT? This is another actual 'false flag' move by Faaux and you know it... but again, only if you have a functional brain, which... probably NOT what I'd call a safe bet at all.

@curt3rd it's a fact in the world of rush limbaugh, glenn beck and the right wing extremist propaganda its media industry churns out. it exists in your alternate reality and parallel universe in which you belief a conspiacy and fraud rigged the 2012 election, as the case was also in 2008.

voters rejected the real republican scheme of desperation in which they would either buy the election with money from whales like sheldon adelson, foster friese, the koch brothers, rupert murdoch, etc. a dirty group of 9 financed a huge proportion of romney's pacs--about $400 million from 9 donors. they tried to commit large scale voter suppression that would have effectively prevented enough voters from voting so that mitt would even have a chance to win. and the most glaring part of the republicans tactics was the outright lies and racist slurs, fear and phony non issues they used.

if americans vote republican again they slit their own throats by voting to coddle the rich and against their own interests. but republicans, the party of stupid, are that way partly because they count on stupid people to vote for them.

@curt3rd Not saying you did. But there is isolated incidences of election fraud on both sides or have you forgotten Strategic Initiatives in Florida. And yet can you honestly look in the mirror and say election fraud is the reason you lost?

@TyPollard@ZacPetit@DonQuixotic They are probably Dad in this analogy, and I believe no matter how deep the pockets of the benefactors of the GOP are, they will eventually stop pouring money in if they feel they will not get back their investment, i.e. if the "public servants" they bought cannot win an election.

@53_3@mantisdragon91 I believe she wrote her views post immigration to the US, but I know form watching her old interviews that she was always frightened of Bolshevik style communism coming to the US and thus wrote her books to be as polar an opposite of it as possible. Hence my point about neither extreme being healthy.

@53_3@mantisdragon91 Ayn Rand was a product of her time, she personally lived through the Bolshevik Revolution and was impacted by what she witnessed. On a personal note my great grandfather on my dad's side had his railroad holdings around St Petersburg, Riga and Talinn confiscated by the then Lenin regime, and yet you don't see me running around screaming that greed is good and helping other equals weakness.

@53_3 Fair enough. The thing that people tend to forget on both sides of the spectrum is that pure anything is rarely if ever healthy. Government isn't always the problem and Business isn't always the solution, and visa versa. I get very concerned about ideologues on both sides pushing the discussion further and further out to the extremes. Unfortunately it does seem like Libertarians tend to have some of the biggest blinders of them all, when it comes to seeing some of the limitations and dangers of their philosophy in its purest form.

The interesting thing is how difficult it was for him to digest the information that was being laid out. I can see that Zac isn't a troll and a good presence at Swampland but the blind spot is illuminating.